1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a musical sound generating device for generating musical sounds with pitches instructed through operations on musical performance operators by using waveform data items indicating waveforms of the musical sounds.
2. Description of the Related Art
Most of the musical sound generating devices, which generate musical sounds through digital processing in accordance with operations on a musical performance operators such as a keyboard, are provided with waveform data items indicating waveforms of the musical sounds. The musical sound generating device generates waveform data of the musical sounds to be sounded by using the waveform data items. The waveform data items are data items each indicating changes in amplitude values for each predetermined time interval.
The tone colors have different musical sound waveforms. Many tone colors vary in musical sound waveform in accordance with a pitch or a velocity in operation on a musical performance operator (including a strength of breath-out). Accordingly, many musical sound generating devices which have a plurality of waveform data items for each tone color have been commercialized. Such a musical sound generating device may generate a musical sound with a higher tone quality. The conventional musical sound generating device disclosed in Jpn. Pat. Appln. KOKAI Publication No. 2007-271827 assigns different waveform data items of the same tone color to different sound ranges.
It is usual for a data amount of the waveform data items to be extremely large. To increase the number of producible musical sounds, there is a need to store the waveform data items in a device accessible at high speed. Therefore, usually, a RAM is adopted as the device. Most of the adopted RAMs are volatile from the aspect of costs. Accordingly, some of the musical sound generating devices store the waveform data items in a non-volatile memory such as a ROM or a flash memory, or an external storage device such as a hard disk drive (hereinafter referred to as “non-volatile device”), and transfer the waveform data items from the non-volatile device to a volatile memory such as a RAM in activation of the device caused by applying power.
The data to be transferred from the non-volatile devices to the volatile-devices with the starting time as a trigger is usually not only waveform data item of one tone color. It is usual for the musical sound generating device to transfer data (data group) of an amount as a whole capable of immediately achieving a minimal function as the musical sound generating device. While the data varies depending on each function mounted on the musical sound generating device, most of the musical sound generating devices transfer music data for automatic musical performance or data of a kind related to musical performance of music score data, etc., in addition to waveform data items of tone colors.
For these reasons, it takes a certain time to transfer data. The conventional musical sound generating device is configured receive instructions by the operations of a user after completion of the transfer. Therefore, there is a problem that a relatively long time is required for the musical sound generating device to become a state capable of generating musical sounds, namely to become a state in which a user is permitted to play the musical sound generating device after activation of the device.
The conventional musical sound generating device disclosed in Jpn. Pat. Appln. KOKAI Publication No. 2000-181491 transfers necessary waveform data items from the non-volatile device to the volatile memory by selecting the music data showing musical performance content of a music. Transferring only the necessary waveform data items achieves transfer at high speed.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a musical sound generating device which quickly becomes a state in which a user is permitted to play the device after activation of the device.